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HANS ERICH BÖDEKER II As traditional theological principles, governing expectations, ways of thinking and empirical knowledge were questioned in the eighteenth century, a new concept of Christianity developed. The Enlightened religious subject demanded certainty of belief; a growing awareness of individual dignity emerged, answering directly only to God. This meant that Enlightened subjects were no longer prepared to put up with being kept in theological leading strings. Their plea for recognition that they had come of age in religious matters was the turning point in the emergence of an Enlightened religious awareness, something that can hardly be imagined without the long-term process by which subjectivity emerged." The young Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, son of a parson and student of protestant theology, was well aware of the specific conditions governing this change in consciousness, and of its dimensions. “Time will tell whether the person who has learned the fundamental doctrines of Christian teaching and is always repeating them, but without understanding them, who goes to church and takes part in all the rites because it is the useful thing, is a better Christian than someone who has once prudently doubted and has found conviction, or is at least seeking it by the path of inquiry.” This is what the twenty year old theology student Lessing wrote to his father, who, although to an extent receptive to new theology, was deeply concerned about his son’s religious development. In his letter Lessing continued: “The Christian religion is not a work that one should accept from one’s parents on trust. Most people inherit it from their parents in the same way that they inherit property, but their behaviour shows what Christians they are”! Lessing, who rejected the state of theological tutelage, could no longer unquestioningly and uncritically see Christianity as a tradition that one could simply accept from ones parents on trust. He demanded forms that would allow him to continue being a Christian without losing his intellectual and moral integrity. Lessing believed that people had to “earn” religious truth “for 14 Cf. JELLOUSCHEK, Hans, “Zum Verhältnis von Glauben und Wissen”, Zeitschrift für katholische Theologie, 93 (1971), 306ff.; THIELECKE, Helmut, Glauben und Denken in der Neuzeit. Die großen Systeme der Theologie und Religionsphilosophie, Tübingen, Mohr, 1983.; OELMULLER, Willi, Die unbefriedigte Aufklärung. Beiträge zu einer Theorie der Moderne von Lessing, Kant und Hegel, with a new introduction, Frankfurt/M., Suhrkamp, 1979.; EBERSOLD, Günther, Mündigkeit. Zur Geschichte eines Begriffs, Frankfurt/M. et al, Peter Lang, 1980. 15 Lessing to his father (30 May 1749); Lessing, Schriften LM, Vol. 17, 17f, cf. YAMASUTO, Toshimasa, Lessing’s Philosophy of Religion and the German Enlightenment, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2002, chapter 1. + 92 +
